O’Connell said the party has done “everything they can” by “going through social media accounts and background checks”.<\/p>\n
“I’ve gone through the process and it is brutal, it’s intrusive,” he told BBC Radio Wales’ Sunday Supplement<\/a>. <\/p>\n “Social media now has been around for 20-plus years, there’s a lot of history there.<\/p>\n “We’ve turned down some genuinely good people just on the off chance that they might have said something slightly off the wall 10, 20 years ago. <\/p>\n “We’ve lost that ability to bring them in because as, I said, digital is forever.”<\/p>\n In 2024, 12 of the party’s candidates for the UK general election were dropped after comments they made<\/a> in the past came to light.<\/p>\n O’Connell has not been officially confirmed as a candidate for the party but, having fronted their party political broadcast this week, he is widely tipped to be their Welsh leader.<\/p>\n Addressing those rumours on Sunday’s BBC Politics Wales<\/a>, he said he was “flattered” but had not had any discussions about it with anyone in the party.<\/p>\n Asked if he was up to the task, he said: “I think so, but I haven’t had a call, I haven’t spoken to anybody at the party so we’ll have to wait and see.”<\/p>\n